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Load Metadata from Microsoft Power BI

Use the Microsoft Power BI Loader to upload metadata to Alteryx Connect from a specified Microsoft Power BI account. You can upload metadata from a user workspace or shared workspace.

Important

After removing the DataMashup file by Microsoft for the newly created Power BI reports, the possibility to create a lineage for new Power BI reports has been lost (for new reports). In case you can't see the lineage for your report, republish the report for the lineage to be corrected and re-run the Power BI metadata loader.

Power BI Requirements

You must have a Microsoft Power BI account to upload from a user workspace. You must have a Microsoft Power BI Pro account to upload metadata from the shared workspace

Power BI Authentication Requirements

To authenticate with Power BI, you need the user name and password for your Power BI instance.

Use a technical account authorized for all required objects (workspaces, reports, etc.).

Register Your Application in Azure Portal

You are required to register the application in Azure portal for all below listed login types. This registration enables you to link your Power BI instance with Azure, and the API access to your Power BI instance.

  1. Do the app registration either via Power BI App Registration Tool or directly in the Azure portal.

  2. Make sure to provide sufficient access rights to your application. An admin consent may be required to grant the privileges to the app. For more information see Configure the way end-users consent to an application in Azure Active Directory.

  3. Upon a successful registration you will retrieve:

  • Client ID – your Azure application identifier (Application ID)

  • Client Secret – Auto-generated secret key for your Azure Web application (Application Secret). You can generate a new Client Secret anytime in the Application Properties screen.

Find Your Tenant ID

  1. Go to your Azure Portal.

  2. Navigate to Properties of your Azure Active Directory. The Directory ID listed in Properties will be your new Tenant ID.

Types of Power BI Authentication

Choose any of the below authentication types depending on the needs of your organization.

  1. Interactive Authentication

    • Required parameters: Power BI username and password, Client ID

    • Use interactive authentication for manually triggered ad-hoc loads. Interactive login is not suitable for scheduled loads as a user is requested to fill his credentials in a web browser upon a start of the workflow (loader).

  2. Client Credentials Authentication

    • Required parameters: Power BI username and password, Client ID, Tenant ID

    • Use client credentials authentication for all deployments where a scheduled load is required and is not using Azure multi-factor authentication. For more information see How it works: Azure Multi-Factor Authentication.

    • In case your organization uses multi-factor authentication, choose either interactive or service principal authentication.

  3. Service Principal Authentication

    • Required parameters: Power BI username and password, Client ID, Tenant ID, Client Secret of your Service Principal.

    • Use service principal authentication wherever you need to trigger a scheduled load including the deployments with enabled Azure multi-factor authentication.

    • Note: Starting June 2019, the service principal authentication can be used only with Power BI “NEW” workspaces. Therefore, you need to migrate all your current workspaces into the “NEW” ones to load all your current Power BI metadata objects using Service Principal.

      Establish Service Principal Authentication

      1. Create a new Service Principal for your Azure application via Azure Powershell or Azure Web Portal.

      2. In case you lose the Client Secret of your Service Principal, you need to create a new one in the Azure portal:

        • Allow the Service Principal to use your Power BI application:

          • Go to your Power BI.

          • Navigate to the Admin portal and allow the Service Principal to use your Power BI application.

          • It may take up to 15 minutes for the change to take effect once applied.

Review Loader Requirements

The Alteryx Connect Loaders must be installed on the machine where Alteryx Server is installed. To install the loaders:

  1. Download the loaders installer. For compatibility, the Loaders installer version must match the Alteryx Connect version.

  2. Run the installer as an administrator.

If you select the Use custom app option, the following Power BI permissions must be assigned:

'Dataset.Read, All Group.Read, All Dashboard.Read, Report.ReadWrite.All, All Group.Read'

Open the Loader

  1. Open Alteryx Designer.

  2. Select Help > Sample Workflows > Alteryx Connect Metadata Loaders > Power BI Loader > Power BI Loader.

Run the App

  1. Select Run as Analytic App

    Run as analytic app button

    .

  2. In the Microsoft Power BI tab, select an application for the loader to use:

    • Use default Alteryx Power BI metadata loader app: This option connects to and harvests metadata from an existing Power BI account without the need to configure custom permissions. Specify a Power BI Username and Password.

      Application Permissions

      When you first run the Power BI app, you are directed to a website to accept application permissions, and then redirected to the Power BI portal. You can close the Power BI portal. The loader waits one minute before attempting to harvest metadata to allow you to accept the application permissions.

      About the default app

      The default application uses Azure Active Directory (AD), which provides basic identity establishment and permissions to harvest metadata from the specified Power BI account using the Power BI REST APIs.

    • Use custom app: This option allows you to use your own app for harvesting metadata. Specify a Client ID and Redirect URL for the application. To register your app in Azure, see the Power BI Documentation.

    1. In the Alteryx Connect tab, type the URL for your Alteryx Connect instance and your credentials.

      https://yourcompany.alteryxconnect.com

    2. Before running the app, select Save button and save the app configuration to the following directory:

      C:\ProgramData\Alteryx\AlteryxConnect\PowerBI_Loader\

      The .yxwv app values file is used for scheduling the loader to run in the Gallery. See Schedule Metadata Loaders.

  4. Select Finish to run the app.

    • If the run succeeds, "Success" appears in the App Results window.

    • If the run fails, a "There were Errors" message appears.

    Depending on how much metadata is being imported, the app can take a long time to run.

View the Metadata

  1. Go to the Alteryx Connect URL and log in.

  2. From the main menu, select Data Sources > Databases.

  3. Select a folder to view its contents.

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